


... going on thirty

by forpeaches (bluecarrot)



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Canon Compliant, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Injury, Marriage of Convenience, Modern Era, Past Abuse, Rape/Non-con Elements, Slow Burn, except not at all, no actual rape but it is still unpleasant, not super dark but bad stuff happens in life so we are going to talk about it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:33:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 6,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23868316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/forpeaches
Summary: back when they were kids, Brienne and Jaime promised that if they weren’t married by the time they were thirty, they’d marry each other.things got a little complex after that.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 92
Kudos: 321





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 28-30 april 2020.

Thirty.

She is _thirty_.

She woke up to half-a-dozen notifications wishing her a happy one, mostly from people she hasn’t actually spoken to in years and didn’t like much when they did. 

One message is from her father.

None of them are from Jaime. 

The shower doesn’t feel different than it did at twenty-nine; the breakfast doesn’t taste different.

She should do something. Clean the apartment, maybe. Get some groceries.

Her phone beeps.

_Welcome to the other side of youth_ , says Jaime.

_Nice of you to keep it warm for me,_ she sends back — being a year older always was a sore spot for him.

_How are you feeling?_ he says.

Casual as hell. Like it’s been a day or a week since they talked, instead of ... She sends  _Pretty disappointed with thirty so far. Run this morning was twenty-seven seconds slower than my personal best_

_Old age already getting its hooks in you, Tarth_

There is something like flirting in his words. It doesn’t surprise her — not really. Jaime’s always been quick to turn on the charm, even with people he’s not interested in. Even with her. Maybe by now it’s a habit he can’t break.

She ought to forgive him. A decent person would. But the memory of his slow smile and those clear green eyes is too much for her temper today. She writes _How’s Cersei?_ and hits send.

Three dots appear.

It’s well above a minute before he says, _I wouldn’t know. Haven’t spoken to her since your graduation._

Brienne hadn’t gone to her graduation. What ...

_I’m in the area,_ he says. _We could meet for lunch. My treat._

*  
  


He looks different. Not only the obvious changes of time and place. Now he’s wearing proper clothes rather than the college-hoodie and sweats; he has a closely buzzed head instead of his rakish curls. And his right arm ends at the wrist.

He studies her. “You’ve changed,” he says.

“Not as much as you.” 

Their waitress is here; they order.

She says, “What’s with the ...” gesturing to his hair.

Jaime runs his hand over it. “Therapist suggestion. Do you like it?”

“Why would your therapist tell you to shave your head?”

“She doesn’t tell me what to do. And you didn’t answer.”

Strangely, because she loved his ridiculous curls, Brienne does like it. He seems all angles now, all punctuation; his eyes violent, his mouth — “You don’t look much like yourself.”

“Hedging the question,” he murmurs. Throaty. A blush crawls up her face.

Their food comes. The waitress looks at Jaime three times and Brienne once, asking if there’s anything else ...?

“Just the check,” says Jaime.

Brienne steals one of his fries. “You’re that desperate to get rid of me?”

“I invited you here. And I see it takes a direct invitation, since you’re never on social media.”

“I stay off it.” Recently. She takes another fry. “These are good.”

“I wouldn’t lead you wrong, Tarth.”

She smiles at him, then. Can’t help it. He’s smiling at her and the room is noisy and glad, and for a second they’re teenagers again in the flatbed of her truck, swapping a joint and looking up at the stars and promising each other anything. Everything.

Then he breaks it. Says “What happened to your face?”

“I was born this way,” says Brienne, stung.

“The scar is new.”

She touches it — the new. Her cheek is barely filled in, the skin still raw and pink. “You must have heard. Tarth isn’t as rural as all that.”

Jaime shrugs. Returns to his food — what’s left of it. And Brienne eats her salad.

It’s strange to see him left-handed. She supposes it’s stupid to feel surprised, his amputation is such old news, but somehow she didn’t realize that now he would be doing everything with his clumsy second-rate hand.

Years of practice have made him casual with it, but she misses the old fluidity he used to have, the easy grace when he beat her at archery, tennis, shooting.

And his laughing confidence when he lost.

“Have you stared your fill?” he says.

She starts. “Jaime, I didn’t mean it like that, I didn’t mean ...”

“You did,” he says. “Come on. Let’s go for a walk.”

*

The cliffs are barely a mile away; the town ends where the dirt does, and then it’s a careful walk on bare rocks. 

They hear the ocean before they see it.

There’s a place with a a good view, a stunted tree growing in a crevice, and they settle down together there, feet hanging out into nothing.

“I missed you,” says Jaime, at last.

This is difficult to believe — or rather, Brienne tries to mistrust it. “You could have called.”

“I was busy.”

“For nine years?”

He doesn’t answer.

Brienne presses her palms against the granite, sparkling pink and white in the sunshine. She could have called him, too. She says, “I assumed you were with Cersei.”

Jaime shakes his head. “She married Baratheon. Did you hear? Not long after we — after you graduated.”

“I thought she wanted to marry you.”

“I thought so, too.” He clears his throat. “I wanted to marry her.”

None of this is making sense. “I nearly married Hyle Hunt. I had the dress and everything.” She doesn’t want to admit aloud that it’s still in her closet, a reminder of folly.

“Why didn’t you?”

How many times has she asked herself that? In recrimination, in anger, in fear. All those midnights when she’s wished the time back to do differently, trying to let herself believe that a stupid, selfish husband is better than none at all. 

Jaime is waiting. He’s looking out over the ocean, a hundred feet down.

Brienne says: “I didn’t marry Hyle because I don’t want him.”

“Who did you want?” Still with that unfamiliar quietness. The Jaime she knew was always laughing ...

“You didn’t call me,” she says again. Her traitorous voice breaks.

Jaime says her name — and when she looks over, he kisses her.

Brienne doesn’t move. Daren’t move. And Jaime is soft and slow and _oh gods_ his mouth is warm, and ...

And his jaw is set. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. I’ll let you be.” He pushes himself backwards onto the solid rock — no easy thing, with one hand — and she has to scramble up after him, stuttering out nonsense.

“What the hell — haven’t you had enough bad luck in your life, to risk — on a _cliff_ , Jaime!”

“I already apologized. It won’t happen again.” 

He’s walking away. And Brienne has no patience left and no shame, either, because she calls out right there in the open: “You could have just asked to come up. Have a coffee. See my apartment.”

He stops. “You’d say no.”

Nine years of waiting for him, and he still thinks she’ll say no? “Come on,” she says. “I make a mean cup of instant.”

*

Once inside, Brienne hesitates, glancing at him, trying to read his face. “Coffee? Or ...”

He settles his hands just above her hips. “I’ve never done this with someone my own height.”

Arrogant idiot. “I’m taller than—”

He kisses her again, harder this time: and she half-leads, half-drags him into her bedroom.

At least the sheets are clean, she thinks; and then he has her down on those clean sheets and she thinks  So this is what he’s been practicing left-handed, because his mouth is under her shirt and he is still taking off her jeans and — fuck. _Fuck_. “Jaime?”

He growls.

“I don’t have any condoms.”

He stops. “I don’t carry a spare in my wallet, if that’s what you’re asking. I’m not seventeen anymore.”

They stare at each other.

“Cersei,” says Brienne, at the same time Jaime says “What about vile Hunt?”

“I’m clean.”

“Tested?”

“Yes, Lannister.” She pushes at him and he sits up, sits back. “What about you?”

“I haven’t ... since she and I broke up.”

Impossible.

But maybe not. She tries to piece it together, trying to think past the aching in her cunt. Graduation was nine years ago, then there was his accident, then Cersei married — yes, she had heard about it, though she’d forgotten until right now. Pictures of Jaime from the waist up, standing near his family, no hands or bandages visible. He had put on weight from some cocktail of drugs — painkillers and steroids and sedatives and, Brienne suspected, a hefty dose of antidepressents as well — and despite the drugs and the tuxedo and the tight smile he looked absolutely miserable.

The extra weight is gone now, and so is the canned smile.  My therapist suggested I cut my hair, he’d said, and snapped  _She doesn’t tell me what to do_ when Brienne politely suggested he was whipped.

Cersei had told him what to do, and he’d done it without asking why.

She cups the back of his head in her hand and takes a deep breath.  _Jaime_. How many times did she imagine him in her bed? 

He looks delicious. He looks  _ edible, _ and Brienne is so hungry. “We’ll do what you want.”

“What  you want,” he says. He cups her breast, rubs his thumb over her nipple; he licks his mouth. “Tell me what you want.”

So she does.

*

Under the skylight in her bedroom, his brow finally loses its frown; his eyes drift shut, his hand slips off her skin, and he sleeps.

*  
  


Sometime in the afternoon he wakes and finds her. Barefoot, barechested, he looks ... groggy.  He peers at her. “Didn’t you say something about coffee?”

“That was a euphemism for sex.”

He snorts and goes to the kitchenette, opening drawers and cabinets and making little noises.

The quiet between them is unbearable. Brienne says “Did you think your life would be like this?”

He pauses. “Bald, one-handed, and chronically alone?”

“You’re not alone,” says Brienne, stung. The Lannisters might not be the best-adjusted of families, but they are pack creatures — threaten one lion and the rest surround you. She would kill for that sort of bonding. 

And he thinks he is  _alone_ .

Jaime comes out. “Last night,” he begins.

“You don’t have to get into that. I — I don’t want a relationship.” 

This is not entirely true, but it is true enough. She doesn’t want to put in the work and be turned down. She doesn’t want to care.

He tests his drink. “I was going to say ... I was thinking about when we were kids. The shit we used to say.”

Jaime is looking at the table, so Brienne looks there too. 

He chose her favorite mug — the one with a rude saying on it. And his coffee is paler than hers: he found the milk. 

Jaime looks pale, too, except for the hot spots of color in his cheeks ....

She wants to reach out, to touch his hand: but that all ended last night. They are different now. “What did we used to say?”

“About us. About growing up. About ... what we wanted. Who we wanted to be.”

“I always dreamt,” says Brienne. “of being bald. And one-handed.”

He smiles a little. “You forgot the part about being alone.”

“You aren’t —“

“I am.”

Silence.

“I used to think — I used to think that — at least Tyrion loved me. My father didn’t, and — and Cersei didn’t — and no one else knew me well enough to be able to say that they did.”

Silence again. Brienne shifts in her chair. “I’ve always been quite fond of you,” she says, awkward.

“We’ve been friends. Yes. And we — we used to say that if we got to be thirty, and didn’t marry, we should marry each other.”

Brienne’s face goes red before she even mentally registers the words. She takes a drink, wishing it were something stronger than coffee. “We were stupid kids. I didn’t mean ...”

“I know you didn’t, Tarth. I’m not saying that. I wouldn’t ...” He runs his hand over his head. “I’m asking you to marry me.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a marriage occurs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the response to this has been a Lot? i am astonished and touched and moved and nervous, because i am not great with pressure & feel sure to write something awful (or not write at all!!) and TOTALLY FAIL a bunch of people. 
> 
> so, like. thanks for making me confront my fears, it’s very healthy

Item the first: This isn’t a real relationship; it’s only for the public.

“Aren’t you too old to be rebelling against your father?”

A grim smile. “Give it time — you’ll be begging for the divorce.”

“And a lifetime of alimony,” says Brienne, only half-serious.

Item the second: They have a shelf-life.

“An expiration date.”

“A date of execution,” says Jaime. “A short fuse.”

Item the third ...

“Don’t lie to me.”

Item the fourth —

“This had better be the last one, Tarth.”

“You got two, I get two,” she says, automatic. “It’s just ... don’t sleep around and make me guess where you are.”

He looks thoughtful. “Monogamy?”

“No.”

They’re outside again. Sunlight makes queer planes on his face of light and shadow, like a Picasso done up in stark lines and drifted parts — while she —

She covers her healing cheek, thinking of Hyle. “Not monogamy. You can fuck other people. I don’t expect you to ... men don’t like to be faithful. It isn’t in them.”

He looks sharp. “One could say the same of women.”

“Women aren’t like that. Most women.”

“And not all men,” says Jaime: but it’s soft now. “Well, I promise to always call you and get the all-clear before I stick it in someone else.”

“Thanks,” dryly. 

“And you ...?”

“What about me?”

“Are you going to run around on me? Break your sacred marriage vows?”

Something like a laugh bubbles up in her throat. It’s thick and hard and she can’t quite breathe around it. “You see what I look like, right? I‘m not exactly beating guys off with both hands.”

He makes a choked noise. “You can beat me off one-handed, I’m used to it—”

Brienne shoves him, laughing, as the septon comes out to announce that it’s time.

*

“— for richer or poorer, better or worse, in good health and ill, do you swear by the old gods and the new —“

Jaime is looking at the floor. “Yes,” he says.

“Yes,” says Brienne, thinking: _Until next year._

“Then repeat after me ...”

Jaime repeats.

Brienne repeats, doggedly. Her blood is ringing in her ears. “I am his, and he is mine ...”

And Jaime kisses her. His mouth is dry and tense, and he does not smile.

*

Outside in the sunlight again, it’s hard to look at him. She says, blindly: “I suppose we need rings.”

“I suppose we do.”

Gods, he’s attractive. Even like this. _I am hers,_ he’d said. 

So what the fuck do they do now?

“Husband,” she says, “wanna get drunk?”

*

There’s a dive bar not even four blocks from Brienne’s apartment — she’s not a regular, but there are times ... 

She goes up to order and Jaime pulls her back. “Let me,” he says.

And then he gets them each a round on the house for being newlyweds, and another from a nearby table for making a joke about his hand, and a third — Brienne isn’t sure why that one comes, but _maybe_ it’s because he is the most beautiful man anyone has ever seen.  He doesn’t even need to take out his wallet, the asshole.

After two dark-and-stormys and a good swallow of Jaime’s whiskey, she leans in to kiss him.

He catches her — hand and stump holding her up. “Careful there, Tarth,” he says.

“I don’t want to be careful. Jaime. Take me to bed.”

His mouth works into a flat line and for a moment she thinks he’s going to refuse her, but — no. He only finds a generous tip and leaves it it behind, winking at the bartender, helping her through the door.

*

He looks like he wants a cigarette, afterwards. He says: “When I heard you were marrying that vile Hunt ...”

“I thought you didn’t hear any news from Tarth.”

“Not all of it.” He touches her cheek. “You hide quite well, out here.”

Does he really not know that story? “I heard about Cersei. Not when it happened — I was — I wasn’t paying attention to much right then. Later, I heard about it. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what? That she cheated on me and dumped me and broke my heart?” He snorts. “You always hated her.”

_Cersei hated me first,_ Brienne could have said, _and she hated me more. And I never understood why._

Right now, though — as Jaime again slips his his hand between her legs, ending the argument — now, maybe Brienne understands.

*

Or maybe not.

Because Tywin Lannister is half a foot shorter than her, and half a century older, and he’s _scary_. He looks angry enough to set her alight with his mind — or freeze her where she stands. There’s little warmth to the man.

He seems mostly furious with Jaime, which is something of a relief. “This marriage will be annulled.”

“Bit late for that, since we’ve spent the whole week fucking,” says Jaime, digging into his supper with false cheer. “Excellent fish.”

Tyrion does not look up. “I had it brought in special. A catch local to your bride.”

Brienne accidentally drops her fork to the floor and, bending over to pick it up, takes the opportunity to make a horrible face beneath the tablecloth. She hates the Lannisters. Bloodthirsty, all of them. Red in tooth and claw.

“Ms Tarth was not a virgin. Therefore the status of your consummation or lack thereof is academic at best.”

“What?”

“You had a long relationship with Hyle Hunt. Your engagement was announced.”

“That doesn’t mean we slept together.”

Tyrion makes a choked noise. “You’ll get more sympathy here if you did sleep with Hunt. I’ve seen his photograph.”

“You will not marry her,” says Tywin to Jaime, ignoring both Brienne’s presence and the _fait accompli_.

Jaime swallows down his wine and smiles. “At least she isn’t a whore. It’s a pleasant change for this family.”

“Are you speaking of Tysha,” says Tyrion, “or Cersei?”

_I used to think,_ Jaime had said, _that at least Tyrion loved me_.

Now he reaches for Brienne’s wine and finishes that, too.

Under the tablecloth, Brienne drives her fork into the tender skin of her wrist. It’s the best thing she can do right now, the only thing she can do. 

*

In the car again, and she is driving back to their hotel — just outside of the city. 

The streetlights flash over Jaime again and again, like some magician’s game: Now you see him ...

He’s rubbing the little scruff of his hair against his palm, now and then scratching his nails into his scalp. Agitated.

“Jaime?”

“Leave me alone,” he says.

So she does.

*

In a way, telling her father is even worse.

Waiting will not make it easier so she does it quickly, calling on videophone while Jaime is in the shower.

Selywn does not take it well. He has notraised his voice to her since her mother died, and he does not now: but he closes his mouth very tightly when she explains it.

“Is this like Hyle?” he says.

“No. Jaime is nothing like Hyle.”

“You loved him.”

Her palms are sweating. “I’ve loved him since we were kids.”

Selwyn has a strange look. “Are you on your honeymoon? Where are you?”

“Kings Landing.” Brienne is leaning in close to the phone, like she can touch him by touching it. She wishes she could touch him. How long has it been since they’ve sat together — eaten together? Talking isn’t the same.

The water turns off in the bathroom. Brienne rubs her hands on her knees. “Dad, I have to go.”

“Is he there?”

“Yes, but he’s — he’s in the shower. We just got back from supper with his family.”

“You traveled all that way to eat with them,” says her father, “but not across the island to see me.”

She can’t find any reply to that.

“Are you happy?” he says.

And Jaime comes behind her, towel around his waist, bare above it and below. She sees his appear in the phone, a tiny threat.

“I’ll call you later,” she says. “Love you, dad.”

He looks tired. And old. “I love you,” he tells her, and reaches out to turn off the connection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -i am an old person and a Luddite. all that facetime zoomy shit is a videophone to me
> 
> -the dark-and-stormy is gingerbeer, dark rum, and simple syrup (add a slice of lime to the side). if that sounds good to you, ME TOO.  
> my craving for all things ginger aside, it sounds like a Tarthian drink. stormy? stormlands? okay.
> 
> -Jaime says it’s a false relationship (#1) and that she not lie to him (#3); Brienne adds in the timeline (#2) and the cheating clause (#4).
> 
> -


	3. Chapter 3

Jaime stands there, mostly naked and slightly dripping. “You told your father.”

“Yes.”

“He took it well.”

Selwyn had not taken it well. “He loves me,” says Brienne. Her mouth feels numb, thick. “He wants ... he wants me to be happy.”

Jaime rubs his head; the arm with its missing hand hangs loose. He looks tired. “I used to think you were making it up — about how kind he is. No, I didn’t say you were lying,” at Brienne’s expression. “Maybe exaggerating. Or just ignoring the bad parts. But he really is like that.”

“He wasn’t always. Before my mother died, it was ... different.”

Jaime sits. “That was before we met, right?”

“A few months.” Her mother had died in late spring, and all the summer holidays were drowned in grief. Returning to school was a relief — freedom from her father’s relentless guilt, his frantic overprotectiveness.

“You helped me,” says Jaime. He’s looking at her strangely.

She can’t help but smile. “You were so pathetic. Someone had to step in.”

He smiles too at that — it looks tight — but leans in to kiss her.

His hand goes around her waist; her hand moves up his thigh. Dear gods. 

She shouldn’t go to bed with him, probably. Probably that’s a bad idea. It’s been such a long day and they’re both unhappy and —

“Bedroom?” he says, soft into her ear.

“If you think you’re up to it,” she says: and slides her hand up a little more.

*

In a certain café outside of Kings Landing, Tywin Lannister makes a new acquaintance. 

A few hours later, Hyle Hunt tucks a roll of cash bills into the back of his sock drawer.

*

Scene: evening on Thursday. The world outside is dark, the apartment is dark, andJaime is a dim form lying face-down on the sofa when Brienne comes in.

She stops with her hand on the light switch, a few feet away from him. “Jaime?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Fine. Just. Therapy.”

Tentative: “Wanna talk about it?”

“Not with you.”

“Is it about your —“

“Brienne.”

“Okay,” she says. “Okay. I’ll be ... if you need me.”

He doesn’t answer.

“Okay,” she says again, and leaves Jaime where he is.

*

In her room alone she undresses and gets into bed, trying not to think. Her phone blinks — twice — and it’s late and she’s tired but no one texts her usually, it might be an emergency, it might be ...

Not her father, thank the gods. And not Margaery or Sansa or anyone else she’s half-kept in touch with. She doesn’t even recognize the number at first. _Thinking of you lately,_ says the text. _Thinking of a lot of things. Could we maybe meet up sometime?_

Hyle. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote an outline for this fic. it’s a miracle.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hyle shows up; Brienne tells the story of what happened to her face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tags updated! also archive warning, because there is canon-typical violence.  
> that’s a thing you should check out.
> 
> *
> 
> in ASOIAF, Jaime uncharitably describes Brienne as stupid, ugly, and slow — slow to think and slow to speak — and Brienne thinks of herself that way, too.  
> But GRRM shows her being clever and perceptive often, so I think maybe both things are true, together.

“Why are you here, Hyle?”

There are in the same diner where Jaime met with her, two weeks ago. Aren’t there any other diners on Tarth?

“I wanted to see you.”

Brienne, disbelieving, pokes the straw deeper into her drink. Has it really only been two weeks? “You haven’t shown much interest in meeting with me until I married someone else,” she says: and watches him flinch.

“I was an asshole —“

“Yep.”

“—after your accident —“

“Accident? Is that what you’re calling it nowadays?” Which part was an accident? she wants to say. When that man pushed me into the couch and bit my face open? When he unbuckled his jeans and told me what would happen if I screamed?

What about when you pretended to be asleep so you wouldn’t have to help?

“I never wanted to see you hurt,” says Hyle, looking pained.

Brienne nods. Which part of that was an accident, Hyle? “Why are you here?”

He sighs. He accepts the food the waitress brings without thanking her, and waits until she is gone before he says “I heard you married that Lannister kid.”

“He’s older than you.”

“How much old — you know, it doesn’t matter. Why would you do that? Just for the money? That isn’t like you.”

She looks down. Rubs her eyes.

“Brie, ... I miss you. I don’t want it to be like this.”

She leans forward, swallowing hard. “Hyle ... I spent so long feeling alone, after that ... the accident, and the hospital, and ... but you really care?”

His face softens; he reachs out his hand towards her. His right hand.

She brushes it with her thumb, lets her eyes drop down and whispers, kind: “I didn’t know.”

“I always have,” he says, so earnest. “You know that, don’t you? That night ... Brie, you know I was hurt, right? You know I’d do anything for you. I was afraid he’d hurt me,” Hyle says, and now he can’t hold back the whine in his voice. “I was afraid.”

“I know,” she says. “I know.”

“You’ll forgive me? We can start again. You don’t need him. We don’t need anyone but us.”

His hand is sweaty. He is always like this — overeager.

And Brienne has never been very original; she’s never been quick on her feet. So she only leans in closer, close enough to kiss him — close enough to sink her teeth into his mouth and tear it off his face. She brushes her lips on his ear and says — loud enough for the fry-cooks and dishwashers in the kitchen to hear — “Fuck off, Hyle.”

And she upends her drink in his lap.

*

Jaime is tired, hollow-eyed. He drinks a beer and doesn’t talk much over dinner — Pentoshi take-out — her treat.

“I missed you,” she says.

“You weren’t gone that long. Did your friend show up?”

Brienne collects herself, with an effort. Her friend. Sure. “Yeah. Couldn’t stay long, though. Just enough time to miss you.” She leans into his arm, his scent. 

“If you want to fuck me,” says Jaime, opening a little cardboard flap, “all you have to do is say so.”

Brienne has to count to seven before she can remember that she likes this man,  most days. “Do you have to think of someone else?”

He takes a bite of beef-and-broccoli and says, mouth full, “What are you on about?”

“When we’re in bed. Do you have to think of someone else, do you have to imagine I’m someone else, so you can—”

“Did someone say that to you?”

“No.” Brienne turns red; she’s always been an awful liar.

Jaime is still eating, but he’s watching her, too. “Hunt said that to you, didn’t he. Was that after you dumped him or before?”

Before. “Afterwards.”

“He’s a dick,” says Jaime, like that’s a simple truth and a simple ending, and she can move on now. “I bet he’s never even—”

“What do you know about this?” Gesturing at her face.

He goes still. “Only what they said in the papers. A home intrusion.”

“It was a little more than that.” Glass under her feet; the smell of car exhaust off the freeway.

“What happened to you?”

“Hyle was there, too.”

“Brienne.”

“He pushed me down,” she said. “He was behind me — I didn’t see him, and he pushed me down. And I was so _stupid_ , Jaime. I just froze. I couldn’t think of what to do. I kept thinking that I shouldn’t fight back. Because that’s what they say — not to fight back. _Play dead_. Like a rapist is a bear, like he’ll leave you alone if you stop being fun to play with.” Her voice is shaking. “I thought: Let him have what he wants, while I go away inside. It won’t last long. It doesn’t ever.” She can’t look at him. “So he — was trying to get ready, you know. Saying vile things to make me ... afraid. And I was afraid. ButI thought of—”

She couldn’t say that. 

“I .... I thought that I could work my arm free. And I took the lamp on the side table and I hit it on his head, over and over until he stopped fighting, til he went limp.” She takes a deep breath. “And then I called the cops.”

“That,” says Jaime, careful, “was _not_ in the papers. Where was Hyle for all this?”

“In the bedroom.”

“In the bedroom.”

“In our bedroom. Hiding. He was afraid.”

“And that — your face — that was broken glass?”

No. But Brienne nods; it feels like less of a lie than speaking would.

Jaime touches her cheek. The whole one. “And then what? Your wonderful fiancé told you he couldn’t get hard anymore by thinking of you; then you throw his things into the street, sell the engagement ring, and ...”

She manages to smile at him. “And then I married a Lannister.”

“You’re a social climber,” says Jaime. “I knew it from the start.” 

Brienne puts her face into his shoulder and laughs, with long choked breaths that sound like sobs.

When she is done, Jaime offers her a piece of broccoli, held delicately on the tines of a fork. “Try it,” he insists, “it’s good” — and he is right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nowadays the prevailing wisdom is to fight back against violence, but as a child i was taught (in school!) that you should definitely just give in.  
> Probably Westeros has similar ideas.
> 
> *
> 
> Exerpt from the _Tarth Local News_ :
> 
> ”... was able to subdue her assailant and notify authorities.
> 
> Biter is currently waiting charges in a Kings Landing hospital facility; the full extent of his injuries, and of the charges to be brought against him, are not yet known.
> 
> Ms Tarth is recovering from  
> her injuries with family. Flowers and other messages may be sent to ...”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime has a therapy session, and wow he needs it

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 14 July 2020.

When Jaime was a child, his aunt Genna — who had married into the family but quickly picked up their flair for drama — Genna routinely accused him of being a fool. “If you had the sense you were born with, Jaime!”

Mostly she said this between her third and fourth drink of the afternoon. The bourbon was always beautiful in the long golden light, and Jaime always wanted to try it. “It’s nasty stuff,” Genna would say, but she let him sip it anyway.

She was right; it tasted vile. Undoubtedly it was half a century old, and cost as much as a small house. “Why do you drink if if it doesn’t taste good?”

“Because I’m a Lannister,” she said. “We all cling to our foolishness.”

Cersei had been there, listening. He remembers that, how her long hair was pinned back in some setting too elaborately time-consuming to be appropriate for a child of her age, how neatly she sat with her legs crossed at the ankle.

He fetched her things all day with a patience that hindsight can’t explain: was that why Genna called him a fool? _Jaime, do this for me. Jaime, I want that._

There is no one to ask. Genna is dead and Cersei is gone and there is only going forward.

If he could go back there, would it be any different? Bourbon is still awful and he would still do anything — anything at all - for his family.

Something of that probably explains why he answers Tyrion’s phonecall.

He shouldn’t answer. He knew that. He’s just come off from therapy, he’s tired in a way that only emotions can cause — not physical and not mental, but something of both.

Nothing, _nothing_ feels worse than failing at therapy. It’s a fifty-minute hour, for fuck’s sake. He used to run marathons, he used to hike mountains and sleep in the open; he’s been eye-to-eye with a bear, he’s lost a hand — he’s even argued with Tywin Lannister and held his ground, which frankly deserves an Olympic medal and a standing ovation.

He used to ...

And now he only goes to therapy and comes home and cries into the sofa cushions.

If he’s lucky, he’ll be able to shower and order in food before Brienne comes home. If it’s a good day. If it’s a bad day ...

It’s a bad day.

Tyrion calls.

If he had the sense he was born with, he’d ignore it. He can almost hear Genna saying that in his head — she sounds remarkably like his therapist, or maybe they’ve melded together into one solid mound of I’m-not-mad-I’m-only-disappointed. 

When she had first said that word, “disappointed,” Jaime blinked.

“Does that upset you?” she said.

“No one’s ever been disappointed in me before,” Jaime said.

“Not even yourself?”

That least of all. But she couldn’t understand that, and he couldn’t explain, so he lied. Yes, of course I’ve let myself down ...

Don’t answer it, says Genna.

“It’s Tyrion.”

He can leave a message.

“It’s Tyrion,” says Jaime again: another thing he can’t explain. How it feels to love someone when every interaction between you is a commodity.

He clicks _accept._ “Hello?”

And then he sits down heavy on the couch, holding the phone between his shoulder and his ear while he pulls tiny bits of fluff off of the cushion, while Tyrion talks, while he waits for Brienne to come home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- i’m writing this instead of editing my novel.  
> what sort of PRIORITIES
> 
> \- Jamie and Cersei are step-siblings here, because it's complex to deal with full-on incest in a modern setting, and i am extremely lazy
> 
> \- Jaime's therapist is Arya. this won't come up in the text, it isn't relevant to the plot, but i really enjoy it because i think she would be a very good and a very BRUTAL therapist, and franky Jaime needs someone to strong-arm him into mental health. OMINOUS POSITIVITY. "You will get better; you have no choice."


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> healing is not a straight line; it’s all twisty-turny-timey-wimey

Healing is not a straight line.

That seems self-evident to the point of insult, like saying “life isn’t easy” and “some discomfort may be expected during childbirth” — but the very banality of the phrase is deceptive. It hides danger. Like drugs slipped into a red solo cup: Here, take this.

Brienne drinks.

Jaime, she has learned, has any number of issues. He is aware of these issues and he Does Not Want To Talk About it. He does not want to talk about his hand (“I’m sure there are articles online, if you’re feeling nosey”), he doesn’t want to talk about money (“Don’t be nouveau-riche”) and he absolutely positively does not want to talk about his family (“I don’t want to talk about that”). Any questions directed at him are redirected towards her, aimed with direct and merciless aim at her soft spots.

And yet:

She comes in from work and he’s prone on the couch, watching some cartoon children film. The lights are off, the place is dark except for the flicker of the screen: if she didn’t see his eyes open and shining, she’d think he was asleep.

He doesn’t greet her.

She sits down on the little bit of space left. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah.”

Drunk, she thinks. Or high. She puts a hand to his face — just to feel his temperature - and he flinches back.

“Sorry.”

He moves his hand down, away from the hairline. “It’s fine.”

It is so clearly *not* fine that there doesn’t seem to be any point in arguing the point. So she goes to the kitchen, finds a drink, finds a snack, and without moving his eyes from the tv, Jaime says: “Did you have a good date?”

When Brienne was a girl, she learned to laugh too much. A defense mechanism, a tin suit of armor: pretend you aren’t hurt and maybe you won’t be. Of course it never worked. But the habit stayed with her, it comes out in her worst moments, when she is already bruised and hurting. Weak.

She laughs now. “What date?”

It’s the wrong thing to say. Jaime’s hand clenches. “I just thought we were going to check in before we went fucking around, but -“

“You’re talking about Hyle Hunt? You think I slept with Hyle?”

“You agreed to talk to me first.” Soft. 

She hates him like this, — she’s so ready to hate someone, and she has always hated this part of him, the Lannister part, inpenetrable. _Where does the_ you _part of you go to when you’re upset?_ she asked him once.   
_Away_ , he said.  
 _Where?  
Just away, inside. Nothing matters that way. If you go far enough._

She’s never been able to do that. Or maybe the opposite is true: it’s too easy, too tempting. 

He’s rubbing the back of his scalp, dragging fingers over the buzzed hair. Slow. It has the grim repetitive motion of a obsession.

”Who told you I went out with him?” she says.

”No one.”

“Jaime.”

He shrugs. “Tyrion.”

“And how did he know?”

“He’s Tyrion. He has a gift. It’s what he does. He drinks and he knows things.”

“Very clever,” says Brienne. “You should put that on a t-shirt —“  
But she stops: neither one of them is listening anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had an extensive outline for this, which i tossed out last month when i decided to stop writing fic (you can see how well those decisions worked out for me)


	7. Chapter 7

He’s three drinks and one argument in, feeling that blur to his emotions that makes them, contrariwise, easier to accept and easier to dismiss. _Where do you go?_ Brienne had said, like it’s a decision.

She’s talking now but she is far away — she’s blurred — and it isn’t until she snaps her fingers in front of his face that he can come back and focus. “Sorry. What?”

She — she has a bag in front of her, and her mouth is set. “I said, get up and pack.”

”What do you mean? Are you ... where are you going?” Leaving, Brienne? Are you leaving me?

He must look as sick as he feels (don’t leave) because her mouth parts and she touches his hand. “We’re going away a few days. This isn’t helping. Being here isn’t helping.”

“Where?” A nice island, he’s thinking. Somewhere in the sunlight, somewhere he can walk on the beach, ...

“Tarth.”

He rolls his eyes — _Tarth!_ — and Brienne laughs. She actually laughs. “It’s not going to be Dorne,” she says. “You’ll want a sweater or two. But it’s a change of scenery, a change of pace ...”

“I — I can’t miss therapy —”

“Calm down. They have telephones and electricity there. Most of the island even has wireless.”

“... _most_ of it?”

The real reason, obviously, is because they haven’t seen Selwyn since their marriage. The real reason is because Selwyn hasn’t seen Jaime.

On the ferry over to the main part of the island, the wind is high and the waves choppy; most of the passengers take shelter in the glass-framed midsection, and stay where they are. One or two even looks green. 

“Landlubbers,” says Jaime to his wife; he is bemused and grateful for a childhood spent messing around on boats.

Of course, most of those boats were yachts — but Kevan had a succession of sailboats, and Addam’s father taught them to race, and ...

And Brienne looks guilty. “Those poor tourists. They must be miserable.”

“They should have known better than to come to Tarth in the winter. Why not go somewhere else? Preferably warm,” he says. “With many fruity drinks, too, and — What?” 

because Brienne is staring at him. 

She reaches out to touch his buzzcut and pulls back, abashed. “The wind is taking the curl out of your hair,” she says.

“It’s putting roses in your cheeks, wench.”

“Tarth roses,” she says. “Look, you can just see the hill leading up to the house.”

Jaime shades his eyes and squints. “I think I can see your father.”

“Shut up,” says Brienne: but she’s smiling again.

Selwyn Tarth isn’t as tall as his daughter; he is stooped down by years and work and a wasting disease that, he says, moves too slow to bother treating. Jaime expects the answer is a bit closer to home, — buried in the island’s little graveyard — but he doesn’t say it, as Selwyn and Brienne meet in a hard embrace.

Selwyn looks at his daughter’s waistline before he speaks — and Jaime doesn’t comment on that, either. But evidentally her stomach meets with her father’s approval, because “Good to have you home,” he says. “And you, Jaime.”

”Yes.” Um. “Thank you for having us.”

”You’re always welcome. You should know that by now.”

“Dad.”

“He is.”

“ _Dad.”_

He reaches an arm around her shoulders. “So are you, little one.”

Unaccountably, they’re given separate rooms.

It’s even more unexpected to hear a soft knock on his door late in the night, and open it to see a tall form in a heavy sweater and boots.

He eyes her. “You look ready for an outing.”

“I’m going to the shore awhile. I thought ... dinner was a lot, and I thought ...”

“Give me five minutes” — he was already undressed, ready to sleep — “and I’ll go with you.”

She nods: but instead of leaving him alone, she slips into the room and sits on the bed, advising him on his clothes. Put something on over that t-shirt, she says, and Don’t you have anything better than skinny jeans, Lannister?

At the door she tugs down a wool cap over his head and folds up the brim. “You lose eighty percent of your body heat through your head, and you don’t have any hair to help insulate.”

”I’ve heard that 73 percent of statistics are made up on the spot,” says Jaime.

“You’ll be grateful enough,” she says, “when we get to the water.”

She’s right. It’s cold as hell — cold as the Wall, most probably — and all along the edges of the water are shards of ice where the ocean laps at the sand. Beneath their feet the naked shingles rub together with creaks and screams — horrible noise — until the roar of the sea overwhelms it.

Brienne raises her chin and looks out over the water.

It’s a moonless night, the world deep and restless, and stars are shivering in the overturned bowl of the sky. Here below, ice crackles on ice with every wave, brittle and crisp, and Jaime shivers too.

”I used to come here after mother died. When I came home from school for breaks, this is the first place I went.”

”Did you ... did you come here with her?” Stupid, he thinks. Stupid. Why am I so insipid? Why can’t I _talk?_ Inside his sleeve, his hand clenches: he feels the urge to pull on his hair.

Brienne shakes her head. “No. Not often.”

“Then why ...”

She shrugs. “I just wanted to show it to you.” 

That isn’t really an answer — or maybe it is — and as she takes his arm, leaning into his side with her warmth, he considers that somewhere in a lifetime of poor decisions, he found the good sense to marry Brienne. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> many (many) thanks to wirette for wanting more.

**Author's Note:**

> this isn’t going to be as cheerful and cute as i intended but HERE WE ARE.


End file.
